Summer-like heat, humidity, storms over the next several days

It may only be May, but summer has made an early visit to southwest, central and southside Virginia. With the wind continuing to move in out of the south, we'll continue to see that warm air riding into the region too.

Regardless of the temperature, the sun is "strong enough" this time of year that you should be wearing sunscreen.

Especially between the hours of 12 and 2 p.m., all it takes is 15 minutes of unprotected skin to get burned.

This is also a good time to remind you that it's too hot to leave any living thing in a car. Even if the air temperature is 80°, the temperature inside a car can rise to 114° within a half hour.

Along with the summer heat and a little dose of humidity, comes the chance for hit-or-miss showers and storms Thursday and Friday afternoons. More numerous showers and storms are likely late Saturday into Sunday morning. A few showers may even linger east of the Parkway into Sunday afternoon. 

This will give us a brief break from the heat and humidity, though. 

The Climate Prediction Center, however, has indicated a high probability of us seeing warmer than average temperatures into next week. 

This is consistent with what we've seen in the StormTeam 10 weather center, as high pressure builds into the southeastern U.S.

As of this article's posting (Wednesday afternoon, 5/1/2019), we are just 51 days away from the official start of summer in the Northern Hemisphere.